


A Devil On Your Back

by OrdinaryBird



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Kevin needs an adult, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-28
Updated: 2015-08-26
Packaged: 2018-04-11 16:23:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4443242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrdinaryBird/pseuds/OrdinaryBird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Abandoned by his delusions, his friends and his God, a confused and injured Kevin fetches up in Night Vale. But when you take away his faith and his home city, is there anything left of Kevin to save?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: And the Rest is Silence

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration for this story comes partially from a post by [call-me-chris-exh](http://call-me-chris-exh.tumblr.com) as well as their beautiful art; I was encouraged by [my darling Cosleia](http://cosleia.tumblr.com) and [vraik](http://vraik.tumblr.com). But if this effort blows up in my face there is no one but me and my many Kevin-feelings to blame.

“No.” 

Kevin blinked at the pages. His face was unusually wet. Which is to say, it was wet, unusually; not sticky and red and warm, but cold, clear, like the light.

“I don’t like this. I am sad.”

And that was unusual too. He was, of course, loosely familiar with sadness. It was related to disappointment, probably, or was the lazy and unproductive cousin of anger. Sadness was the death that came before the rebirth, the dark in a room before you opened the curtains to the sun.

It had always been so easy to _stop_ , before. Just...don’t think about it!

He pushed the letter out of his line of sight, pushed the sound of Carlos’ voice out of his mind.

But the _feeling_ didn’t go away. It felt like someone had tied a string to the inside of his navel and yanked, doubling him over, leaving him hollow and hurting. He rested his head against the desk.

He had to do something. He couldn’t move.

“Vanessa?” His voice sounded foreign to his own ears, crumbling around the edges like old newspaper. “Vanessa, could you come in here for a minute?”

Yes. That’s what he needed. His friend. He still had his friend. Vanessa, so loyal and so understanding.

She didn’t answer. 

“Vanessa, are you there?”

Silence. The crackle and distant static of dead air. 

He hated silence.

“Vanessa, _please--_!” His voice broke, his throat contracted oddly, and there was a strange sound he couldn’t identify, except that it came from him.

And then he sniffled. Was he sick, too, on top of everything else?

 _I built this for you,_ he thought hazily. Yes. Carlos had so liked to listen to the radio, tried whenever he could to hear Night Vale’s reports. So at first he built the station for his own use, so Carlos would have the local news, which would be more helpful for his very important work and probably have a more reliable connection. And when Cecil had come to visit, he’d figured he could share airtime. Sure he could! And then they would have two friends, he and Vanessa wouldn’t be alone, and in no time it would be just like home.

The equipment beeped accusingly. Dead air is, after all, the mortal sin of radio. But there was no one out there to hear it, was there? No concerned, kind warning from Vanessa, and Carlos was going, if not gone, and there was no one to fill the air for, no ears waiting for the cheerful reassurance of his voice. There was nothing.

Years (decades?) of devotion, of faith, of turning his face into the blinding bright light and walking with his eyes closed and his hands open, talking, talking all the while. And now there was nothing. 

The staticky silence crackled in his head. Had he been forsaken, finally? Was he being punished, for letting the vile, human longings of his imperfect self interfere with the work he should have been doing?

But...why? He’d been so good--he’d done everything he was supposed to, he’d lived a good and productive life, he’d smiled his way through the pain of being fixed, of casting off his imperfect shell. And now he was alone.

Was he no longer useful?

Carlos had left, Vanessa had left, and now even his God seemed to have abandoned him.

For the first time he could remember, Kevin was alone.


	2. Belling the Cat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to Chickaddddddd for the beta

According to Carlos’ observations, it took Cecil nearly two weeks to relax.

The first night they talked, side by side in bed, holding hands, watching each other, discussing the future. And then the past. And then the promise of the present. Cecil spoke steadily and slowly, as if putting off the moment of sleep, and they touched consistently. They made love as the sun rose and finally slept, Cecil curled in the crook of Carlos’ arm.

The next morning Carlos brought him coffee in bed. 

“I think I’ve finally got it,” he said, cautiously tapping the door with his hip to close it, “taste this and let me know--”

Cecil cut him off with a kiss, so sudden that Carlos stumbled, sloshing coffee from both cups down his hands and onto the sheets.

“Sorry,” Cecil said, smiling shyly as he grabbed a t-shirt from the floor to dab at the spots, “I just--you weren’t here when I woke up. I thought I’d just dreamed you back again. But you’re really here, this time.”

The volume of texts petered out to normal, pre-Desert Otherworld levels, and Carlos noticed less and less movement from the wall-side of the bed at night, as though Cecil was sleeping more deeply.

Things, of course, would never be the same, but they were becoming the same kind of different, and Carlos liked that. They’d grown and changed, of course--everyone did--but they had grown together, and their relationship reached a different kind of comfortable now.

And there it stayed, for a bit at least.

“ _You._ ”

Cecil slammed the door and crossed through the kitchen in long strides, picking up speed as he moved towards the living room sofa. “You son of a bitch _how did you find my house--_ ”

Carlos nearly fell off the couch as he stumbled to his feet to intercept Cecil, holding his hands up in what he hoped was a consoling way. “Cecil--Cecil, honey, it’s fine, I brought him here--he was wandering on the edge of town--”

“And is there any particular reason he is trailing blood on our sofa instead of a cell in the abandoned mineshaft?” Cecil leaned around Carlos and snapped, “Do we even know who or what it came from?” He gestured at the red spots on the upholstery. 

“No, no, Ceec, it’s okay--I think it’s actually his--” Carlos glanced at Kevin over his shoulder.

“Oh what a relief, Carlos, thank you, I’m delighted to hear that the blood on my throw pillows came from fucking _Kevin_ \--”

At the sound of his name, Kevin looked up, acknowledging Cecil for the first time. “Oh, hello,” he said brightly. 

They were still for a second. Carlos stared over his shoulder, and he could almost feel the heat of Cecil’s glare. But Kevin didn’t seem to have anything else to say.

“Cecil,” Carlos said quietly, still watching Kevin, “can I speak to you in the other room, please?”

“I guess it’s fine to leave him alone, he’s already ruined the carpet--”

Carlos pulled Cecil into the bedroom, pointedly not mentioning the note of hysteria in Cecil’s voice. The door had hardly closed before he burst out, “Carlos, what were you thinking _you know he’s dangerous_ \--”

“Ceec, I don’t think he’s that dangerous anymore. Think rationally--”

“Don’t you _tell me_ to think rationally, Carlos!” Cecil pointed to himself and hissed, “This, right here? Anger and fear? This is the rational response to your boyfriend inviting a madman with a crush into your home!”

“That--let’s put that aside for now.” Carlos took Cecil’s hand for an affectionate squeeze, and while he didn’t seem particularly soothed, at least he seemed willing to listen. “He hadn’t really mentioned any Smiling God stuff for a while before I left. And he didn’t seem--I dunno, angry, or possessive. I think he’s just lonely, and doesn’t know how to express it. He doesn’t really know how to express _anything_ ,” Carlos added thoughtfully. “I don’t even think he’s ever happy--not like you’re happy. He’s...cheerful. That’s not the same thing.” He looked back to Cecil, tried to make him meet his eyes. “He’s sick, Cecil.”

“Good, I’m glad that we can agree on something. Kevin is sick. Duly noted. Can we show him out now?”

“We need to find a place for him.”

Cecil was disconcertingly blank. “What.”

“He needs a safe place. Somewhere to go back to if things get overwhelming. He needs to know he has an ally. If he has some place to go--someone to talk to, someone who can actually help him learn to feel things again--he might not lash out again.”

“Okay,” Cecil said slowly. “That makes sense. The violent murderer needs a confidant and a place to stay. But where you’re losing me, my darling Carlos, is the part where this became _your_ responsibility.”

“I know him.”

“Yeah, and I know him too, that doesn’t mean I--”

“You do.” Carlos nodded aggressively, pleased with the possibility that Cecil was seeing his point. “And I think you’ll set a good example for him.”

There was a tense and awkward pause; apparently, Cecil had not taken his meaning. “Carlos, I’m not really a good example to _anyone_.”

“You’re so emotional--you _feel_ so much, so strongly, and I think seeing someone telegraph their feelings would be a good way--”

“ _Carlos I do not telegraph,_ ” Cecil snapped.

His teeth were gritted and his hand was wrapped tightly around Carlos’ fingers.The other was clenched around the hem of his shirt. 

“Honey, you’re doing it right now.”

Cecil dropped Carlos’ hand and crossed his arms over his chest. “This whole conversation is ridiculous. He will meet other people, and I’m not the only person in Night Vale who--who--” he waved his hands for a second, then pulled them back when he noticed the grandness of the gesture. 

“I think I can help him. Sure, I’m no psychiatrist--just a scientist--but I understand a few things about the human brain.”

“So you take him to the lab and you introduce him to one of your science friends and then--”

“ _Cecil_.” Carlos swallowed, startled by the aggravation in his own voice. “I’m not stupid. I know what I’m doing. If he trusts _us_ \--or at least _me_ \--we know where he is. We know what he’s doing. And we’ll be his baseline for social norms in Night Vale, meaning we’ll have an influence on his behavior.”

Cecil said nothing. He still seemed a little unsettled by Carlos’ frustration; his crossed arms were slack, his shoulders slumped, his eyes focused intently on the wall to the right. 

“It’ll be okay,” Carlos said again, softer.

“It won’t.”

“It will.”

Cecil’s voice was thin and choked, and he blinked rapidly. “If you get yourself murdered, I’ll never forgive you,” he said, and they both knew it was a lie. He cleared his throat and went on, “he can stay the night. That’s it.”

“Okay.”

“And then you find somewhere else for him.”

“I will.”

“And you better not get hurt--”

“I will be fine.” Carlos closed the space between them and pulled Cecil close, who stood rigid and unmoving in his arms. “I promise.”

 

Carlos dug through the linen closet for the spare towels. The last thing either of them needed was to accidentally ruin one of Cecil’s nice towels. Cecil never did explain why he was so fond of them, but either way Carlos would respect that, and anyway he was sure he had saved one or two of his when they condensed their lives into one home.

What he finally produced was a little tattered on the edges, but dark enough to hide any rogue bloodstains. 

He knocked twice on the bathroom door, then opened it just wide enough to fit his arm through. Even though his nose was pressed against the door, he still squeezed his eyes shut respectfully as the towel was pulled from his hand.

It occurred to Carlos, as Kevin emerged, that he’d never actually seen him _clean_ before. Unstained. Cecil could have spun the moment into some lovely metaphor, but Carlos just found it interesting. 

Kevin’s hair was slicked down and he was just a bit too small for the sweatpants and t-shirt Carlos had loaned him. He was about the same size as Cecil, but, like his towels, Cecil was very particular about his clothing.

There was probably a metaphor in that, too. 

Kevin was quiet as Carlos addressed the wounds, which were mostly either superficial or already closed over. He was quiet when Carlos heated some leftover soup. 

It was the quietest Carlos had ever seen him.

And Carlos would be the first to admit that he wasn’t very good at reading faces, but Kevin’s expression was a complete mystery. Now clean, and in normal indoor lighting rather than perpetual desert sun, Carlos could see thick lines of scarring, mostly centered around his lips, small, recent scratches scattered around them. He wasn’t cheerful, but also didn’t seem particularly upset. If anything, he was blank.

“Eat the soup,” Carlos said, partly just the fill the silence. “After that we’ll go to the lab. If you’re willing to I’d like to do some tests. Ask you a few questions.”

“You already know everything there is to know about me,” Kevin said finally, and his voice was quiet, but pleasant. Maybe a little distracted. Not distraught, though.

“Scientifically speaking, you’re a mystery,” Carlos said, picking bits of lint off the table cloth. “I know a lot about you as a person, but your medical history? All that stuff is just, like, variables. And I want to eliminate as many variables as possible.” 

“Variables,” Kevin echoed. “May I ask why you’re so interested?”

“In what? In--in you?”

“Yes.”

“Well, it’s--it’s a challenge. A mystery. It was really the last thing I expected, you finding your way back here. I’d like to know what happened, and what’s happening now.”

Kevin nodded, and something happened to his lips, something that was not a smile, something that perhaps wanted to be a smile but could not bend the emotions underneath to its will. “A curiosity.” 

“Look, that’s not what I meant, it’s not like--”

“But--oh!” Kevin burst out suddenly, “Oh, Carlos, couldn’t we _pretend_ we’re still friends?”

Carlos’ hands stilled, and he attempted to seek eye contact, to try for reassurance. “Of course we’re still friends, that’s why you’re here...”

Kevin shook his head, still not-smiling, and said nothing. 

After another moment of silence, he ate a bite of soup.


End file.
